[1] The title character is the female reporter Barbro Magnus ("Penholder") who becomes a sympathiser with the campaign for women's suffrage in Sweden.
She falls in love with the young architect Dick Block, and the couple defies contemporary social norms by living together without being married.
At the time of the novel's publication, women had already made a mark in the profession of journalism in Sweden, and Elin Wägner herself was employed as a reporter from 1908.
Ellen Key described the novel as brave and alive, although she thought the love story was neglected in favor of the suffrage theme, and Gertrud Almqvist-Brogren praised it for the theme of free love: "The novel will make it clear to more than one, that it is the thruth, a woman's toward oneself and others, that will save purity" rather than a marriage certificate.
Fredrik Böök and Bo Bergman both agreed that the literary quality was neglected in favor of its political agenda, and the suffragist Ann Margret Holmgren was concerned that the radical and controversial free love theme would damage the campaign for women's suffrage.